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  • 1.  Simple staging

    Posted 02-14-2016 14:21

    I am looking for some ideas on plays that will challenge my high school students but can be produced with a limited set and stage.

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    Candice Corcoran
    Kennesaw GA
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  • 2.  RE: Simple staging

    Posted 02-15-2016 07:25

    Try The Servant of Two Masters.  We did it a few years ago in full Commedia style, and the only really necessary part of the set was the curtain. As far as a challenge goes, you can take that as far as you'd like.  Since the characters were street performers, all of my kids learned to juggle;  because we had duels, several learned to fence; as it was Commedia, all but the ladies made and wore masks and everyone had to study and embrace their stock character; and true to form, much was improvised.  We had a blast.

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    Jan Romans
    Theatre Director
    South Lyon MI

    Original Message


  • 3.  RE: Simple staging

    Posted 02-15-2016 08:37

    Anything by Shakespeare can be done with a minimal set.

    We had great fun with Play On! by Rick Abbot.  It is supposed to take place on the stage of a cash-strapped community theatre.

    Stardust by Walter Kerr takes place in the theatre classroom of a very small college.  That show has the advantage of having an expandable company of "students."  Great fun! 

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    C. J. Breland
    Asheville High School
    Asheville NC

    Original Message


  • 4.  RE: Simple staging

    Posted 02-15-2016 10:49

    Thank you for all the input. I am trying to plan my season for next year with the thought that I may not have access to a conventional theatre space. 

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    Candice Corcoran
    Kennesaw GA

    Original Message


  • 5.  RE: Simple staging

    Posted 02-15-2016 11:08

    Pretty much most plays could be done with minimal set, as an aesthetic choice or for performance space considerations or for budget. My sets are minimal mainly for budget constraints.

    For challenge and minimal set, we are about to open 'The Crucible' as an arena stage in our school gymnasium. The play itself is something of a challenge, to which my students are rising to admirably, let alone the fact that we are staging it with audience on all four sides. We also staged 'Antigone' in the gym, as a traverse, which has some similar but quite different challenges to arena staging.

    As a previous poster said, Shakespeare can be done minimally, and you can claim original practices. :)

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    Phillip Goodchild
    Theatre Arts Instructor/Assistant Department Head of English
    Ruskin FL

    Original Message


  • 6.  RE: Simple staging

    Posted 02-15-2016 11:09

    On the same line, you could also do a devised piece, because that, depending on how you set it up, can be done with a very minimal set indeed.

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    Phillip Goodchild
    Theatre Arts Instructor/Assistant Department Head of English
    Ruskin FL

    Original Message


  • 7.  RE: Simple staging

    Posted 02-15-2016 11:49

    LEAVING IOWA and ALMOST MAINE are both limited sets and challenging to act! 

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    Suzanne Craig
    HS Theatre Director
    Lipscomb Academy High School
    Nashville TN

    Original Message


  • 8.  RE: Simple staging

    Posted 02-15-2016 12:49

    Many plays can be done with a minimal set, but even that minimalism has to be "designed" and be there for a reason.

    I'm a full-time set designer, and the best set I've ever seen was at the Royal Shakespeare Company's home in Stratford-upon-Avon one summer when they were doing the four Henry plays, by Shakespeare, in rotating rep. The set for all four plays was a bare raked stage, and I do mean bare: no curtains, no legs or borders, no backdrop, nada. We could see all the way to the back wall of the theatre, to the sides of the stage, and up into the flies. Minimal furniture and props. But when the actors started to talk, we were grabbed and shaken and transported to wherever they wanted to take us. All four plays were beyond awesome. The RSC has deep pockets and lots of resources, and could have done anything they wanted, but that was the choice they made and we sat there thinking that massive and gorgeous sets would have been totally superfluous.

    The biggest problem I've seen with minimalism over the years is a lack of commitment to the choice. So we end up with "we need this, we need that, oh, let's put a flat back there." Minimalism is about stripping away every physical thing that doesn't actually carry the story forward, and letting the actors take the lead. It's about putting the story--the real story--first and making some creative (and difficult) choices to keep everything visually consistent. But the results, like that summer at the RSC, can be an awesome theatrical experience for both the audience and the actors.

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    George F. Ledo
    Set designer
    www.setdesignandtech.wordpress.com
    www.georgefledo.net

    Original Message